. Greek athletic sports and festivals . earch in the voidfirmament by day, so neither shall we find any games greaterthan the Olympic whereof to utter our voice. ^ The sanctityof Olympia and its festival go back to days far earlier thanthe coming of the Dorians, perhaps of any Greek race; butthe growth of the festival dates from the time when, after theDorian invasion, the movements of the peoples ceased and theland became settled, and its greatness is largely due to theathletic ideal and the genius for organization which characterizedthat race. It is not the least of the many debts which weow
. Greek athletic sports and festivals . earch in the voidfirmament by day, so neither shall we find any games greaterthan the Olympic whereof to utter our voice. ^ The sanctityof Olympia and its festival go back to days far earlier thanthe coming of the Dorians, perhaps of any Greek race; butthe growth of the festival dates from the time when, after theDorian invasion, the movements of the peoples ceased and theland became settled, and its greatness is largely due to theathletic ideal and the genius for organization which characterizedthat race. It is not the least of the many debts which weowe to Heracles, says Lysias in his Panegyric, that by institut-ing the Olympic games he restored peace and goodwill to aland torn asunder by war and faction and wasted by uses similar language of the restoration of the gamesby Iphitus and Lycurgus, whose action another tradition ascribesto the advice of the Delphic oracle. But though we can hardly ^ Paus. iv. 4, 1 ; iv. 33, 2.^ Pindar, 01. i. (E. Myers translation).. 36 GREEK ATHLETIC SPORTS AND FESTIVALS chap. credit the founders of the games, whoever they were, with thisfar-sighted Panhellenic policy at so early a date, the traditionis founded upon facts : the first Olympiad does mark the settle-ment of Greece, and the festival did jDromote the unity of growth, though not its origin, was due to the Dorians. Olympia lies about ten miles from the sea on the northernbank of the Alpheus, at the point where its valley spreads outinto a wide and fertile plain. In an angle formed by this riverwith its tributary the Cladeus, which rushes down from themountains of Elis between steep banks formerly shaded withplane-trees, at the foot of the pine-clad hill of Cronus, stoodthe grove of wild olive-trees, brought there according to tra-dition by Heracles from the land of the Hyperboreans, thesacred grove from which the Altis took its name. The slopesof the neighbouring hills were covered with a variety of tre
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